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SPEECH " 'IS^' 



SENATOE S. A. DOUGLA.^ 

OF ILLINOIS, 

ON 

THE STATE OF THE UiMO.X. 



DELIVERED IN THE SENATE O FTHE UHITED STA TES, JANUAEY 3, 1S51. 

Mr. DOUGLAS said: 

r.^IiZV^?^"'!'- ^^•°^',* «f "yP"^He life has ever caused me so rauch regret ns the 
necessiy of voting in the special committee of thirteen for the resolution reportiLt 
JLtoreneaceTJr'''''^;^ "^-"^ upon any general plan of adjustmenrwhES wfuH 
«S^>f I ^ country and- insure the integrity of the Union. If we wish to under 
X .t;:h!ldirst:?;f ''^'^ ^r^^^rKr^ wide-spread „nd deep-seated dlc'ttt" 
v„^. fK. ^. u ^ ' ^''^'""^t g« l^ack beyond the recent presidential election and 

trace the or.g.n and history of ihe slavery agitation from the period when itS be^am^ 
en active element in Federal politics. ^V^tllout fatiguing the Senate with tedious detaS ' 

v^^he'Sll'r' ^«^««-;'V^'''^^"* '\ f«aro?-cissful conti Action h" .£ 
ever the federal Government has atten.pted to decide and control the slavery ciueion 
in the newly acquired Territories, regardless of the wishes of the inhabitant^ \l emn Jn 

?im !k^' '"t 7"' ''''^\' ""*^ ^'''''''\ ''^^« *^"«"^'^' ^'^^ ^l^^^'^^v-er Congress h^srefrSed 
voW f •'>t^''-'^«f.^"^,«. 'larmony and fraternal feeling have been restored. The Xk 

iZ The mo't n?V"'',7' •""•^' ^' «""fiJ«r '-" ^PP^'^'^^^ '^ '" ^"PPort of this pTopt 
brZht he UnionT h'"^ ' '"''■:!"?"' *''■" '^^"^ ^^^'^^'"^"^ ^^^^^^'^'-'l controversies which 
iTrU I ?■ ^^ ^'',^ ""^'^^ ^* disruption in 182u, and again in 1850. It was the 

fnTi T ,'l"''*''*°-'° "''''* "^'" ^^''''^''^ presented the cliief points of difficulty berause it 
nvolved th. irritating question of the relative political poWer of the two Stions Ail 
the other questions, which entered into and served to increase the slavery ag'ta ion wfi^ 
deemed ot secondary importai^e. and dwindled into insignificance so soin !s the t'erX: 
rial question was definitely settled. teniio- 

From the period of the organization of the Federal Government, under the Constitu- 
bask oVno '■''• tT '° ''f ' f.'' '^' '-^"'^"^''"^ governments had beek organi ed u J on tie 
r;r?fh . • f ■'^"''"'f ^^' Congress with the domestic institutions of the people. Du 
ring that period several new Territories were organised, including Tennessee, Louisiana 

fo n7/r!ui"'-:rP/J'' '"^ ^•"^'^r-, ^" °° °"^ «^ "''^^^^ Territonef did Congr'essTtt mpx 
to interlere with the question of slavery, either to introduce or exclude, protect or pr^o- 
nu,it It. Dunng the whole of this period there was peace and good will between the 
people of all parts of the Union, so far as the question of slavery was concerned 
repardlia ^ffV'"^ Congress ever attempted to interfere with and control that question, 
regardless of the wishes of the people interested in it, the Union was put in jeopardy 
and was only saved Irom dissolution by the adoption of the corai.romise of IS'^O. In the 
lamous Missouri controversy, the majority of the Korth demanded that Congress should 
prohibit slavery forever in all the territory acquired from France, extending from the 
State of Louisiana to the British possessions on the North, and from the Mississippi to 
tne Kock-y Mountains. The South, and the conservative minority of the JS'orth on the 
contrary, stood firmly upon the giuun.l of non-intervention, deuviug the right of Congress 
to touch the subject. They did not ask Congress to interfere fur protection nor foi any 
purpose, while they opposed the right and justice of exclusion. Thus, each party with 
their respective positions distinctly defined— the one for and the other against cousrres- 
Bional intervention— maintained its position with desperate persistency until disnnioa 
eeemed inevitable, when a compromise was effected by an equitable partition of the terri- 
tory between the two sections ou the line of 86" 80' prohibiting slavery on the one =^ide 
and permitting it on the other. 



In tlie adoption of tliis compromise, each party yielded one half of its claim for the sate 
of the Union. It was designed to form the basis of perpetual peace on the slavery ques- 
tion by estahlisliing a rule'in accordance with which all future controversy would be 
avoided. The line^of partition was distinctly marked, so far as our territory might ex- 
tend ; and, by irresistible inference, the spirit of the compromise required the extensioa 
of tlie line on the same parallel whenever we should extend our territorial limits. The 
l^'orth and the South— altliough each was dissatisfied with the terms of the settlement, 
each having surrendered one half of its claim— by common consent agreed to acquiesce 
in it, and abide by it as a permanent basis of peace upon the slavery question. It is true 
that there were a few discontented spirits in both sections who attempted to renew the 
controversy from time to time, but the deep Union feeling prevailed, and the masses of 
the penple'were disposed to stand by the settlement as the surest means of averting future 
difficulties. 

Peace was restored, fraternal feeling returned, and we were a happy and united people 
so long as we adhered to and carried out, in good faith, the Missouri compromise accord- 
ing to its spirit, as well as its letter. In 184.5, when Texas was annexed to the Union, 
the policv of an equitable partition on the line of .36' 30' was adhered to and carried 
into etxeet by the extension of the line as far westward as the new acquisition might reach. 
It is true, there was much diversity of opinion as to the propriety and wisdom of annexing 
Texas. In the North the measure was opposed by large numbers upon the distinct ground 
that it was enlarging the area of slave territory within the Union; and in the South it 
probably received much additional support for the same reason ; but, while itmay have 
been opposed and supported, in some degree. North and South, from these considerations, 
no considerable number in either section objected to it upon the ground that it extended 
and carried out the policy of the Missouri compromise. The objection was solely to the 
acquisition of the country, and not to the application of the Missouri compromise to it, 
if acquired. No fair-minded man could deny that every reason which induced the adop- 
tion of the line in 1820 demanded its extension thrajigh" Texas, and every new acquisition, 
whenever we enlarged our territorial possessions in tl^t direction. No man would have 
been deemed faithful to the obligations of the Missouri- compromise at that day who was 
opposed to its application to future acquisitions. 

The record shows that Texas was annexed to the Union upon the express condition 
that the Missouri compromise should be extended and made aj^plicable to the country, so 
far as our new boundaries might reach. The history of that acquisition will show that I 
not only supported the annexation of Texas, but that I urged the necessity of applying 
the Missouri compromise to it, for the purpose of extending it through New Mexico and 
California to the Pacific ocean, whenever we should acquire those Territories, as a means 
of putting an end to the slavery agitation forever. 

The annexation of Texas drew after it the war with Mexico, and th,e treaty of peace 
left us in possession of California and New Mexico. This large acquisrtion of new terri- 
tory was made the occasion for renewing the Missouri controversy. The agitation of 
1849-'.50 was a second edition of that of 1819-20. It was stimulated by the same mo- 
tives, aim.ing at the same ends, and enforced by the same arguments. The northern 
majority invoked the intervention of Congress to prohibit slavery everywhere in the 
Territories of the United States — both sides of the Missouri line — south as well as north 
of 8G° 30'. The South, together with a conservative minority in the North, stood firmly 
upon the ground of non-intervention, denying the right of Congress to interfere with the 
subject, but avowing a willingness, in the spirit of concession, for the sake of peace and 
the Union, to adhere to and carry out the policy of an equitable partition on the line of 
36' 30' to the Pacific ocean, in the same sense in which it was adopted in 1820, and 
according to the understanding when Texas was annexed in 1845. Every argument and 
reason, every consideration of patriotism and duty which induced the adoption of the 
policy in 1820, and its application to Texas in 1845, demanded its application to California 
and New Mexico in 1848. The peace of the country, the fraternal feelings of all its parts, 
the safety of the Union, all were involved. 

Under these circumstances, as chairman of the Committee on Territories, I introduced 
into the Senate the following proposition, which was adopted by a vote of 33 to 21 in 
the Senate, but rejected in the House of Representatives. I read from the Journal, August 
10, 1848, page 563: 

•• On motion by Mr. Douglas to amend the bill, section fourteen, line one, by inserting after the word 
' enacted : ' 

'■That the line of thirty-six degrees thirty minutes of north latitude, known as the Missouri compro- 
mise line, as defined by tlie eighth section of an act entitled 'An act to authorize the people of the Mis- 
8i>iiri Territory to form a constitution and State government, and for the admission of such Slate itno the 
Uiiiiin on an equal footing with the original States, and to proliiI>it slavery in certain Territories, approved 
March fi, 1S20,' be, and the same is hereby, declared to extend to the Pacific ocean; and the said eighth 
secti(Mi, together with Dip compromise theVein effected, is hereby revived, and declared to be in full force 
and binding, for the fiiiurc organization of the Territories of the United States, in the same sense, and 
with the same understandiiii;-, with wliich it was originally adopted; 

'•It was determined in the affirmative— veas 3-3, navs 21. 

'•On moti(m by Mr. Baldwin, the yeas and nays being desired by one-fifth of the Senators present, 
those who voted in the affirmative are: 

'•Messrs. Atchison, Badger, Bell, Benton, Berrien, Borland, Briaht, Butler, Calhoun. Cameron, Davis 
Of Mississippi, Dickinson, Douglas, Downs, Fitzgerald, Foote, Hannegun, Houston, Hunter, Johnson <rf 



Marj-land, J-ohnson of Lonisiana Johnson of Georgia, King, Lewis, Mangum, Mason, Metcalf, Pearce, 
Sebastian, Spniance, Sturgeon, Turaey, Undenvood. , ^ ^a , rcaiv,.., 

"Those wlio voted in the negative are: 

"Jfessrs. Allen, At herton. Baldwin, Bradbury, Breese, Clark, Corwin, Davis of Massachusetts, Dayton, 
Uix, Dodge, i-elch. Green, Hale, Hamlin, Miller, Niles, Phelps, Upham, Walker, Webster. 
00 the proposed amendment was agreed to." 

Tlie bill, as amended, was then ordered to be engrossed for a third reading, by a vote 
of 3.3 to 22, and was read the third time, and passed on the same day. By the classifica- 
tion of the votes for my proposition to carry out the Missouri compromise, it will be seen 
that nil the southern Senators, twenty-six in number, including Mr. Calhoun, voted in the 
affirmative; and of the northern Senators, seven voted in the affirmative and twenty-one 
in the negative. The proposition was rejected in the House of Representatives by almost 
a sectional vote, the whole South voting for it, and a large majority of the North against it. 
It was the rejection of that proposition— the repudiation of the policy of an equitable 
partition of the territory between the two sections, on the line of 36° 30' — which re-opei)ed 
the floodgates of slavery agitation and deluged the whole country with sectional ^^'ife 
and bitterness, until the Union was again brought to the verge of-disruption, before the 
swelling tide of bitter waters could be turned back, and passion and prejudice coul(i^e 
made to give place to reason and patriotism. ,',, 

Had the Senate's proposition been concurred in by the House of Representatives; had ' 
the policy of uii equitable partition been adhered to; had the Missouri compromise been 
c»rried out in good faith, through our newly acquired territory, to the Pacific ocean, there 
■would have been an end to the slavery agitation forever. For, the line of partition be- 
tween free and slave territory being once firmly established and distinctly defined from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific, all new acquisitions, whether on the North or the South, would 
have conformed to that adjustment, without exciting the passions, or wounding the sensi- 
bilities, or disturbing t!ie harmony of our people. I do not think it would liave made 
any material difference in respect to the condition of the new States to be formed out o f 
Buch territory, for I have always believed, and often said, that the existence or non-exist- 
ence of African slavery depends more upon the necessities of climate, health, and produc- 
tions, than upon congressional and territorial enactments. It was in reference to this 
great truth that Mr. Webster said that the condition of all the territory acquired from 
Mexico, so far as the question of slavery was concerned, was irrevocably fixed and settled 
by an irrepealable law — the law of climate, and of physical geography^ and of the forma- 
tion of the earth. You might as well attempt by act of Congress to compel cotton to 
grow upon the tops of the Rocky Mountains and rice upon the summits of the Sierra Ne- 
vada, as to compel slavery to exist, by congressional enactment, where neither climate, 
nor health, nor productions, will render it necessary and self-sustaining. Yet the desire, 
on the one hand, for the extension of slavery into regions where it is physically impossible 
to sustain it, and, on the other hand, to abolish and exclude it from those countries where 
the white man cannot endure the climate and cultivate the soil, threatens to keep the 
agitation of this question perpetually in Congress, until the passions of the people shall 
become so infiamed that civil war and disunion shall become inevitable. It is the terri- 
torial question — whether slavery shall exist in those vast regions, in utter disregard of the 
wishes and necessities of the people inhabiting tliein— that is convulsing and dissolving 
the Republic; a question in which we have no direct interest, about which we have very 
little knowledge, and which the people of those Territories must and will eventually de- 
cide lor themselves and to suit themselves, no matter what Congress may do. But for 
this territorial .juestion there would be very little difficulty in settling the other matters 
in controvers}-. The Abolitionists could never endanger the peace of the country or the 
existence of the Union, by the agitation of the slavery (juestion in the District of Columbia 
by itself, or in the dock-yards, forts, and arsenals in the slaveholding States, or upon the 
fugitive slave law, or upon any minor issue, or upon them all together, if the territorial 
question could be finally and irrevocably settled. 

I repeat^ it was the repudiation of the policy of the Missouri compromise, the refusal 
to apply it to the territory ac(|uired from Mexico, when ottered by me, and supported by 
the whole South, in August, 1S4S, which reopened the agitation and revived the Missouri 
controversy. The coirfpromise of 1820 once repudiated, the policy of an equitable parti- 
tion ol the territory abandoned, the [>roposition to extend it to the Pacific being rejected, 
and the original controversy reopened with increased bitterness, each party threw itself 
back on its original extreme position — the one demanding its exclusion everywhere, and 
the other insisting u]ion its right to go everywhere in the Territories, regardless of the 
wishes of the people inhabiting them. All tlie arguments, pro and con., used in 1819-20 
were repeated in 181!)-'50. The question was the same, and the relative position of the 
two sections the same. 

Such was the condition of things at the opening of the session of 1849-'50, when Mr. 
Clay resumed liis seat in tliis body. 

The purest patriots in the land had become alarmed for the fate of the Republic. The 
immortal Clay, whose life had been devoted to the rights, interests, and glory of his 
country, had retired to the shades of Ashland to prepare for another and a better world. 
When, in his retirement, hearing the harsh and discordant notes of sectional strife and 
disunion, T.^j consented, at the earnest solicitation of his countrymen, to resume his seat 



in the Senate, the theater of his great deeds, to see if, by his experience, his wisdom, the 
renown of his great' name, and his strong hold upon the coniidence and afi'ections of the 
American people, he could not do something to restore peace to a distracted country. 
From the moment of his arrival among us he became, by common consent, aiid as a matter 
of course, the leader of the Union men. His first idea was to revive and extend to the 
Pacific ocean the Missouri compromise line, with the same understanding and legal effect 
in which it had been adopted in 1820, and continued through Texas in 1S45. I was one 
of his humble followers and trusted friends in endeavoring to carry out that policy, and 
in connection with others, at his special request, carefully canvassed both Houses of Con- 
gress to ascertain whether it was possible to obtain a majority vote in each House for the 
measure. We found no difhculty with the southern Senators and Eepresentatives, and 
could secure the cooperation of a minority from the Korth ; but not enough to give us a 
majority in both Houses. Hence the Missouri compromise was abandoned by its friends, 
Nox/rowi choice, but from inability to carry it into effect in good faith. It was with ex- 
treme reluctance that Mr. Clay, and those of us who acted with him and shared his con- 
fidence, were brought to the conclusion that we must abandon, from inability to carry 
out, the line of policy which had saved the Union in 1820, and given peace to the country 
for many happy years. 

Finding ourselves unable to maintain that policy, we yielded to a stern necessity, and 
turned onr attention to the discovery of some other plan by which the existing ditficulties 
could be settled, and future troubles avoided. I need not detail the circumstances under 
which l\Ir. Clay brought forward his plan of adjustment, which received the sanction of 
the two Houses of Congress and the approbation of the American people, and is faniiliarly 
known as the compromise measures of 1850. These measures were designed to accomplish 
the same results as the act of 1820, but in a different mode. The leading feature and chief 
merit of each was to banish the slavery agitation from the Halls of Congress and the 
arena of Federal politics. The act of 1820 was intended to attain this end h\ an equitable 
partition of the Territories between the contending sections. The acts of 1850 were de- 
signed to attain the same end by remitting the whole question of slavery to the decision 
of the people of the Territories, subject to the limitations of the Constitution, and let the 
Federal courts determine the validity and constitiitionality of the territorial enactments, 
from time to time, as cases should arise and appeals be taken to the Supreme Court of the 
United States. The one, proposed to settle the question by a geographn?al line and an equi- 
table pai-tition ; and the other by the principles of popular sovereignty in accordance with 
the Constitution. The object of both being the same, I supported each in turn as a means 
of attaining a desirable end. 

After the compromise measures of 1850 had become the law of the land, those who had 
opposed their enactment appealed to their constituents to sustain them in their opposition, 
and implored them not to acquiesce in the principles upon which they were founded, and 
never to cea*se to war upon them until they should be annulled and effaced from the 
statute-book. The contest before the people was fierce and bitter, accompaijied sometimes 
with acts of violence and intimidation; but fortunately, Mr. Clay lived long enough to 
feel and know that his last great ettorts for the peace of the countrj- and the perpetuity 
of the Union — the crowning acts of a brilliant and glorious career in the public service — had 
met the approval and received the almost unanimous endorsement of his grateful country- 
men. The repose v/hich the country was permitted to enjoy for a brief period proved to be 
a temporary truce in the sectional conflict, and not a permanent peace upon the slavery 
question. The purpose of reopening the agitation for a congressionail prohibition of sla- 
very in all the Territories whenever an opportunity or excuse could be had, seems never 
to have been abandoned by those who originated the scheme for partisan purposes, in 
1819, and were baffled in their designs by the adoption of the Missouri compromise in 
1820 ; and who renewed the attempt in 1848, but were again doomed to suffer a mortify- 
ing defeat in the adoption of the comproujise measures of 1850. The oppoi'tunity and 
pretext for renewing the agitation was discovered by those who had never abandoned 
the design, when it became necessary, in 1854, to pass the necessary laws for the organi- 
zation of the Territories ot Kansas and Nebraska. The necessity for the organization of 
these Territories, in order to open and protect the routes of emigration and travel to Cali- 
fornia and Oregon could not be denied. The measure could not be postponed longer 
■without endangering the peace of the frontier settlements, and incurring the hazards of 
an Indian war, growing out of the constant collisions between the emigrants and the In- 
dian tribes through whose country they were compelled to pass. 

Early in December, 1853, Senator Dodge, of Iowa, introduced a bill for the organiza- 
tion of the Territory of Nebraska, which was referred to the Committee on Terntories, 
of which I was chairman. The committee did not volunteer their services on the occa- 
sion. The bill wa* referred to us by the vote of the Senate, and our action was in dis- 
charge of a plain duty imposed upon us by an express command of the body. 

The first question which addressed itself to the calm and deliberate consideration of the 
committee was: upon what basis shall the organization of the territory be formed? 
"Whether iipon the theory of a geographical line and an equitable partition of the terri- 
tory in accordance with the compromise of 1820, which had been abandoned by its sup- 
porters, not from choice, but from our inability to carry it out j or upon the principle of 



Bon-intervention and popular sovereignty, according to the eomprouiise measures of ISoO, 
which had taken the place of the Missouri compromise? 

The coraMiittee, upon mature deliberation, and with great unanimity, decided that all 
future territorial ortranizations should be formed upon the principle and model of the 
oompromisi^uieasures of 1850, inasmuch as in the recent presidential election (1852) both 
of the great political parties of the country, (Whig and Democratic,) of which the Senate 
was composed, stood pledged to those measures as a substitute for the act of 1820; and 
the committee instructed me, as their organ, to prepare a report and draft a substitute 
for Mr. Dodge's bill in accordance with these views. I will now read from the record, at 
the hazard of being somewhat tedious, in order that the Senate and the country may 
jndge with what fidelity I performed this duty: 

" Janaary 4th, ISU, Mr. Douglas made the following report : ' The Committee on Territories, to which 
was referr.-d a bill lor an act to establish the Territoi-y of Nebraska, have given the same that serious 
and deliberate consideration which its great importance demands, and beg leave to report it back to 
the Senate, with various amendments, in the form of a substitute for the bill. 

"'Tlie principal amendments which your committee deem it tlieir duty to commend to the favora- 
ble action of the Senate, in a special report, are those in which the principles established by the com- 
promise rneasiirea of 1.S.00, 80 far as they are applicable to territorial organizations, are proposed to be 
atHriiu'd and carrieil into practical operation within the limits of the new Territory. 

"'The wisdom of tliose measures i.s attested, not less by their salutary and beneficial effects in allay- 
ing sectional agitation and restoring peace and harmony to an irritated and distracted peojile, than 
by tlie cordial and almost universal ap|>rol)ation with which tliey have been received and sanctioned 
by the whole country. In the judgment of your committee, those menxiiref! icere intended to hare a 
far more comnreheiiiite and en'iiirjug effect than the mere ailjnstment of the di-fflculties arUing 
out of t/oe recent ac/uUition of Meo-ic.nn territory. Tliey were deM'jned to efstablUh certain great 
priricijileK. irhich irouUl not onJ>/ furnish adequate remedies for existing evili, but in alt time to 
come aroid the periix of a similar agitation, hy vfithd raid Jig the quastioyi of slarery from tho 
ZTal/n of Congrenn and the political arena, and committing it to the arbitrament of those who were 
immediat^ely interei^ed in, and alone rei>poni<iljle for, itn consequences. "With the view of conform- 
ing their action to what they rcijard the settled policy of the Government, sanctioned by the approving 
voice of the American people, your committee have deemed it their duty to incorporate and perpetu- 
ate in their territorial bills the principles and spirit of those measures." 

After reviewing the provisions of the legislation of 1850, the committee conclude as 
follows: * 

"From these provisions it is apparent that the compromise measures of 1S50 affirm and rest upon 
the following propositions: 

"First, That all (luestions pertaining to slaver}- in the Territories, and in the new States to be form- 
ed thtrel'roiii, are to be left to the decision of the peojile residing therein, by their appropriate repre- 
sentatives, to be chosen by them for that purpose. 

"Seconil, That 'all c^ses involving title to slaves,' and 'questions of personal freedom,' are refer- 
red to the adjiiilicalion of the local tribunals, with the right of appeal to the Supreme Court of the 
United Slates. 

"Third, That the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, in respect to fugitives from 
service, is to be carried into faithful execution in all ' the organized. Territories,' the same as in the 
States. 

The substitute for the bill which your committee have prepared, and which is commended to the 
favorable action of the Senate, jiropo.tes to carry thote proposit/io-ns and principles into practical 
operation, in the i'kkcise l.vnouagb of tuk comi'eoiuse measuues of ISoO." 

No sooner was tliis report and bill printed and laid upon the tables of Senators, than 
an address was prepared and issued over the signatures of those party leaders who had 
always denonneed " the Missouri compromise as a ciime against freedom, a compact with 
infamy," in which the bill was "arraigned as a gross violation of a saered pledge ;" " as a 
criminal betraj'al of precious rights;" and the report denounced as "a mere invention, 
desigited to cover up from public reprehension meditated bad faith." 

The Missouri compromise was "infamous," in their estimation, so long as it remained 
upon the statut*)-book and was carried out in good faith, as means of preserving the 

fieace of the country and preventing the slavery agitation in Congress. But it suddenly 
lecaine "a saei'ed pledge," a "solemn compact for the preservation of precious rights," 
the moment they had succeeded in preventing its faithful execution and in causing it to 
be nbauiloned when it ceased to be an impregnable barrier against slavery agitation and 
sectional strife. The bill against which the hue and cry was raised, and the crusade 
preached, did not contain a won! about the Missouri comprotuise, nor in any manner re- 
fer to it. It simply allowed the people of the Territory to legislate for themselves on all 
rightful subjocts of legislation, and left them free to form and regulate their domestic in- 
stitutions in their own way, subject only to the Constitution. So far as the Missouri act, 
or an^' other statute, might be supposed to conflict with this right of self government in 
the Territories, it was, by inference, rendered null and void to that extent, and for no 
other purpose. Several weeks afterwards, when a doubt was suggested whether, under 
the bill as it stood, the people of the Territory would be authorized to exercise this right 
of self-government upon the slavery question, during the existence of the territorial gov- 
ernment, an amendiiunt was adopted, on my tuotion, for the sole and avowed purpose of 
removing that doubt and securing that right, in accordance with the compromise measures 
of 1850, as stated by me and reported in the debates at the time. The amendments will 
be found in the fourteenth sectiwu of the act, and is as follows : 

"That the Constitution and all laws of the United St.ates which are not locally inapplicable, shall 
hare the the same force and effect within the said Territory of Nelnaska as elsewhere within the United 
States, except the eighth section of the act preparatory to the ailmission of Missouri into the Union, ap- 
proved March 6, 1520, which, being inconmtent with the principle of nonrintervention by Congress 



6 

trith Hlareri/ in the Staffs and Territorial, as eecognized by the legisultion of 1850, ccnnmonly 
called the conipromiso measures, is hereby declared inoperative and void ; it being the true intent antl 
meaning of this act not to legislate slavery into any Territory or State, nor to exclude it therefroin, 
hut to li-ave, the jieojile thereof jierfectly free to form and re(julat& their doraeatic institutions in their 
own tcay, subject only to the Constitution of the United States." 

In my opinion this amendment did not change the legal effect of the bill as reported 
by the committee. Its object was to render its meaning certain, by removing all doubts 
in regard to the right of the people to exercise the privileges of self government on the 
slavery question, as well as all others consistent with tlie Constitution, during their terri- 
torial condition, as well as when they should become a State. From that day to this, 
there has been a fierce and desperate struggle between the supporters and opponents of 
the territorial polic}', inaugurated under tiie auspices of Mr. Clay, in 1850, and affirmed 
in the Kansas-Nebraska act in 1854 — the one to maintain and the other to overthrow the 
principle of non-intervention and popular sovereignty, as the settled policy of the gov- 
ernment in reference to the organization of Territorie.?, and the admifsiou of new States, 
This sketch of the origin and progress of the slavery agitation as an element of politi- 
cal power and partisan warfare, covers the entire period from the organization of the 
Federal Groverntnent under the Constitution, in 1789, to the present, and is naturally 
divided into three parts: 

First. From 1789, when the Constitution went into operation, to 1819-'20, when the 
Missouri controvers}- arose, the Territories were all organized upon the basis of non-in- 
tervention by Congress with the domestic affairs of the people, and especially upon the 
question of African slavery. During the whole of this period, domestic tranquility and 
fraternal feeling prevailed. 

Second. From 1820, when the Missouri compromise was adopted, to 1848 and 1850, 
when it was repudiated and finallj' abandoned, all the Territories were organized with 
reference to the policy of an equitable partition between the two sections upon the fine 
of 36° 30'. During tliis period there was no serious difficulty upon the territorial ques- 
tion, so long as tlie Missouri compromise was adliered to, and carried out in good faith. 

Third. From 1850, whea the original doctrine of non-intervention, as it prevailed du- 
ring the first thirty years, was re-established as the policj' of the Government in the 
organization of Territories, and the admission of new States, to the present time, there 
has been a constant struggle, except for a short interval, to overthrow and repudiate the 
policy and principles of the compromise measures of 1850, for the purpose of i-eturning 
to the old doctrine of congressional intervention for the prohibition of slavery in all the 
Territories, south as well as north of the Missouri line, regardless of the wishes and con- 
dition of the people inhabiting the country. 

In view of these facts, I feel authorized to reaffirm the proposition with which I com- 
menced my remarks, that, whenever the Federal Government has attempted to control 
the slavery question in our newly-acquired Territories, alienation of feeling, discord, and 
sectional strife have ensued ; and whenever Congress has refrained from such interfer- 
ence, peace, harmouj', and good will have returned. The conclusion I draw from these 
premises is, that the slavery (question should be banished forever from the Halls of Con- 
gress and the arena of Federal politics by an irrepealable constitutional provision. I 
have deemed this exposition of the origin and progress of the slavery agitation essential 
to a full comprehension of the difficulties with which we are surroui"ided, and the reme- 
dies for the evils which threaten the disruption of the Republic. The immediate causes 
which have precipitated the southern country into revolution, although inseparably con- 
nected with, and fiowing from the slavery agitation, whose history I have portrayed, are 
to-be found in the result of the recent presidential election. I hold that the election of 
any man, no matter who, by the American people, according to the Constitution, furnishes 
no cause, no justification, for the dissolution of the Union. But we cannot close our eyes 
to the fact that the southern people have received the result of that election as furnishing 
conclusive evidence that the dominant party of the North, which is soon to take posses- 
sioti of the Federal Government under that election, are determined to invade and destroy 
their constitutional rights. Believing that their domestic institutions, their hearthstones, 
and their family altars, are all to be assailed, at least by indirect means, and that the 
Federal Government is to be used for the inauguration of a line of policy which shall 
have for its object the ultimate extinction of slavery in all the States, old as well as new, 
South as well as North, the southern people are prepared to rush wildly, madl}-, as I 
think, into revolution, disunion, war, and defy the consequences, whatever" they may be, 
rather than to wait for the development of events, or submit tamely to what they think 
IS a fatal blow impending over them and over all they hold dear on earth. It matters 
not, so far as we and the peace of the country and the fate of the Union are concerned, 
whether these apprehensions of the southern people are real or imaginary, whether they 
are well founded or wholly without foundation, so long as they believe them and are 
detenuined to act uj.on them. The Senator from Ohio, (Mr. Wade,) whose speech was 
received with so much favor by his political friends the other daj-, referred to these seri- 
ous apprehensions, and acknowledged his belief that the southern people were laboring 
under the conviction that they were well founded. He was kind enohgh to add that he 
did not blame the southern people much for what they were doing under this fatal mis- 
apprehension ; but cast the whole blame upon the northern Democracy; and referred 



especially to his eoUeagne and myself, for having misrepresented and falsified the purpo- 
ses and policy of the Republican party, and for having made the southern people believe 
our misrepresentations! He does not blame the southern people for acting on their honest 
convictions in resorting to revolution to avert an impending but imaginary' calamity. Iv o ; 
be does not blame them, because they believe in the existence of tlie danger; yet he ■vrill 
do no act to undeceive them; will take no step to relieve their painful apprehensions ; 
and will furnish no guarantees, no security against the dangers which they believe to 
exist, and the existence of which he denies; but, on the contrarj', he demands uncondi- 
tional submission, threatens war, and talks about armies, navies, and military force, for 
the purpose of preserving the Union and enforcing the laws! I submit whether this 
mode of treating the question is not calculated to confirm the worst apprehensions of ibe 
southern people, and force them into the most extreme measures of resistance! 

I regret that the Senator from Ohio, or anj- other Senator, shoidd have deemed it con- 
sistent willi his duty, under present circumstances, to introduce partisan politics, and 
attempt to manufacture partisan capital out of a question involving the peace and safety 
of the countr3\ 1 repeat what I have said on another occasion, that, if I know myself 
my action will be influenced by no partisan considerations, until we shall have rescued 
the country from the perils which environ it. But since the Senator has attempted to 
throw the whole refponsibility of the present difficulties upon the northern Democracy, 
and has charged us with misrepresenting and falsifying the purposes and policy of the 
Republican party, and thereby deceiving the southern people, I feel called up to repel 
the charge, and show that it is without a shadow of foundation. No man living would 
rejoice more than myself in the conviction, if I could only be convinced of the fact, that 
I have misunderstood, and consequently misrepresented, the policy and designs of th-e 
Republican partj*. Produce the evidence and convince me of my error, and I will take 
more |>leasure in making the correction and repairing the injustice than I ever have taken 
In denouneini; what I believed to be an unjust and ruinous policy. 

With the view of ascertaining wliether 1 have misapprehended or misrepresented the 
policy and purposes of the Republican party, I will now inquire of the Senator, and yield 
the floor for an answer: whether it is not the policy of his party to confine slavery 
■withiii its present limits by the action of the Federal Government? Whether they do 
not intend to abolish and ju'ohibit slavery by act of Congress, notwithstanding the deei- 
cision of the Supreme Court to the contrary, in all the Territories we now possess, or may 
hereafter ac((uire? Whether he and his party are in favor of returning to their master 
tlie fugitive slaves that may escape? In short, I will give the Senator an opportunity 
nww to say 

Wr. WADE. Mr. President 

Mr. DOUGLAS. One other question, and I will give way. 

Mr. WADE. Very well • 

Mr. DOUGLAS. I will give the Senator an opportunitj' of saying now whether it is 
not the policy of his party to exert all the power* of the Federal Government xmder the 
Constitution, according to their interpretation of the instrument, to restrain and cripple 
the institution of slavery, with a view to its ultimate extinction in all the States, old as 
■well as new, south as well as north. 

Are not these the views and purposes of the party, as proclaimed by their leaders, and 
understood by the people, in speeches, addresses, sermons, newspapers, and public meet- 
ings? Now, I will hear his answer. 

Mr. WADE. Mr. President, all these questions are most pertinently answered in the 
speech the Senator is professing to answer. I have nothing to add to it. If he wiU read 
BCiy speech, he will find my sentiments upon all those questions. 

Mr. i)Ob'GLAS. Mr. I'resident, I did not expect an unequivocal answer. I know too 
well that the Senator will not deny that each of these interrogatories do express his in- 
dividual polic}' and the policy of the Republican party as he understands it. I should 
not have propounded the interrogatories to him if he had not accused me and the northern 
Denjocracj- of having misrej>resented the policy of the Republican party, and with having 
deceived tiie southern people by such misrepresentations. The most obnoxious sentiments 
I ever attributed to the Republican party, and that not in the South, but in norlhera 
Illinois and in the strongholds of Abolitionism, was that they intended to exercise the 
powers of the Federal Government with a view to the ultimate extinction of slavery in 
the southern States. I have expressed my belief, and would be glad to be corrected if I 
am in error, that it is the policy of that party to exclude slavery from all the Territories 
we now (lossess or may ac<juire, with a view of surrounding the slave States with a cor- 
don of abolition States, and thus confine the institution within such narrow limits that, 
when the number increases beyond the capacity of the soil to raise food for their subsist- 
ence, the institution must end in starvation, colonization, or servile insurrection. I have 
often expt-sed the enormities of this policy, and appealed to the people of Illinois to know 
\fhether this mode of getting rid of the evils of slavery could be justified in the name of 
civilization, humanity, and Christianity? I have often used these arguments in th^ 
strongest abolition portions of the Xorth ; but never in the South. The truth is, I have 
always been very mild and gentle upon the Republicans when addressing a southern 
aijdieuce, for it seemed ungenerous to say behind their backs, and where they dare not 



8 

go to reply to me, those things which I was in the habit of saying to their faces, and in 
the presence of their leaders, where they were in the majorit}'. 

But innsmuch as I do not get a direct answer from the Senator who mal»es this charge 
sirainst the northern Democracy, as to the purposes of that party to use the power of the 
Federal Government under their construction of the Constitution, with a view to the 
■ultimate extinction of slavery in the States, I will turn to the record of their President 
elect, and see what he saya. on that subject. The Republicans have gone to the trouble 
t.-' collect and publish in ]>amplilet form, under the sanction of Mr. Lincoln, tlie debates 
which took place between him and myself in the senatorial canvass of 18.58. It may not 
be improper here to remark that this publication is unfair towards me, for the reason that 
Mr. Ijincoln personally revised and corrected^his own speeches, without giving me an op- 
portunity to correct the numerous errors in mine. Inasmiaeh as the publication is mad^e, 
under the sanction of Mr. Lincoln himself, accompanied by a letter from him that he has 
revised the speeches by verbal corrections, and thereby approved them, it becomes im- 
portant to show what his views are, since he is in tlie daily habit of referring to those 
speeches for his present opinions. 

Mr. Lincoln was nominated for United States Senator by a Republican State conven- 
tion at Springfield, in the year 1858. Anticipating the nomination, he had carefully pre- 
pared a written speech, which he delivered on the occasion, and which, by order of the 
convention, was published among the proceedings as containing the platformjof principles 
upon which the canvass was to be conducted. More importance is due to this speech 
than to those delivered under the excitement of debate in joint discussions by the exigen- 
cies of the contest. The first few paragraphs which I will now read, may be taken as a 
fair statement of his opinion and feelings upon the slavery question. Mr. Lincoln said; 

"Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Convention, if we could flrstknow where wo are and whither 
we are tending we could better judtre what to do and how to do it. TVe are now far into the fifth year 
since a iwlicy was initiated with the avowed olijeet and confident promise of putting an end to sla- 
very agitation. Under the opfration of that policy, that agitation has not only not ceased, but has 
constantly augmented. It is my opinion, it will not cease until a crisis shall have been reached and 
passed. A house divided against itself connot stand ! I believe this Government cannot endure per- 
manently hulf slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved-^I do not expect the 
house to fall— l)ut I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the 
other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the pub- 
lie mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction, or its advocate will 
push it forward, till it shall alike become lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well 
as South." 

There you are told by the President elect that this Union cannot permanently en- 
dure divided into free and slave States ; that these Stages must all become free or all slave, 
all become one thing or all become the other; tiiat this agitation will never cease until 
the opponents of slavery have restrained its expansion, and have placed it Avhere the 
fublic mind Avill be satisfied that it will be in the course of ultimate extinction. Mark 
tue language : 

'•Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it?" 

"We are now told that the object of the Republican party is to prevent the extension 
of slavery. What did Mr. Lincoln say? That the opponents of slavery must first pre- 
vent the further spread of it. - But that is not aU. What else must they do? 

'-And place it where the public mind can rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate ex- 
tmoliou." 

The ultimate extinction of slavery, of which Mr. Lincoln was then speakinff, related 
to the States of tliis Union. He had reference to the southern States of this confederacy ; 
for, in the next sentence, he says that the States must all become one thing or all the 
other— "old as well as new, north as well as south"— showing that he meant that the 
policy of the Republican party was to keep up this agitation in the Federal Government 
until slavery in the States was placed in the process of ultimate extinction. Hiovf, sir, 
when the Republican committee have published an edition of Mr. Lincoln's speeches con- 
tmning sentiments like these, and circulated it as a campaign document, is it surprising 
that tlie people of the South should suppose that he was in earnest, and intended to carry 
out the policy which he had announced? 

I regret the necessity which has made it my duty to reproduce these dangerous and 
revolutionary opinions of the President elect. No consideration coidd have induced me 
to have done so but the attempt of his friends to denounce the policy which Mr. LincoLa 
Las boldly advocated, as gross calumnies upon the Republican party, and as base inven- 
tions by the northern Democracy to excite rebellion in the southern country. I should lite 
to tind one Senator on that side of the Chamber, in the confidence of the President elect, 
who will have the hardihood to deny that Mr. Lincoln stands pledged by his public 
speeches, to which he now refers constantly as containing his present opinions, to carry 
out t.ie policy indicated in the speech from which I have read. I take great pleasure in 
sayin-, liowever, that I do not believe the rights of the South will materially suffer un- 
der the administration of Mr. Lincoln. I repeat what I have said on another occasion, 
tnat neither he nor his party will have the power to do any act prejudicial to southern 
"1 11 i' 1 "'^^^''^^t^' " *'i® Union shall be preserved, and the southern States shall retain 
a full delegation in both Houses of Congress. With a majority against them in this body 



9 

aod in the House of Representatives, tliey can do no act, except to enforce the laws, with- 
out the consent of those to whom the South has confided her interests, and even his ap- 
pointments for that purpose are subject to our advice and confirmation. Besides, I still 
indulge ihe hope that when Mr. Lincoln shall assume the high responsibilities which will 
8O0U devolve upon him, he will be fully impressed with the necessity of sinking the poli- 
tician in the Statesman, the partisan in the patriot, and regard the obligations which he 
owes to his cou-fitry as paramount to those of his party. In view of these considerations, 
I had indulged the fond hope that the people of the southern States would have been 
content to remain in the Uiiion and defend their rights under the Constitution, instead of 
rushing mally into revolution and disunion, as a refuge from apprehended dangei-s which 
may not exist.. 

But tliis apprehension has become wide-spread and deep-seated in the southern people. 
It has taken possession of the southern mind, sunk deep in the southern heart, and filled 
them with the conviction that their firesides, their family altars, and their domestic insti- 
tutions, are to be ruthlessly assailed through the machinery of the Federal Government. 
Tlie Senator from Ohio says he does not blame j-ou, southern Senators, nor the southern 
people, for believing those things; and yet, instead of doing those acts which will relieve 
your apprehensions, and render it impossible that your rights should be invaded by Fed- 
eral power under any Administration, he threatens you with war, armies, military force, 
under pretext of enforcing the laws and preserving the Union. We are told that the 
authority of the Government must be vindicated ; that the Union must be preserved; 
tliat rebellion must be put down ; that insurrections must be suppressed, and the laws 
must be enforced. I agree to all this. I am in favor of doing all these things according 
to the Constitution and laws. ]S'o man will go further than I to maintain the just author- 
ity of the Government, to preserve the Union, to put down rebellion, to suppress insur- 
rection, and to enforce the laws. I would use all the powers conferred by the Constitu- 
tion for this purpose. But, in the performance of these important and delicate duties, 
it must be born in mind that those powers only must be used, and such measures em- 
ployed, as are authorized by the Constitution and laws. Things should be called by the 
right naiues; and facts, whose existence can no longer be denied, should be acknowledged. 

Insurrections and rebellions, although unlawful and criminal, frequently become suc- 
cessful revolutions. The strongest Governments and proudest monarchs on earth have 
often been reduced to the humiliating necessity of recognizing the existence of Govern- 
ments (U facto, although not de jure, in their revolted States and provinces, when rebel- 
lion has ri[iened into successful revolution, and tlie national authorities have been ex- 
pelled fiom their limits. In such cases the right to regain possession and exact obedi- 
ence to the laws remains; but the exercise of that right is war, and must be governed 
by the laws of war. Such was the relative condition of Great Britain and the American 
colonies for seven years after tiie declaration of independence. The rebellion had pro- 
gressed and matured into revolution, with a Government de facto, and an army and navy 
to defend it. Great 'Britain, regarding the complaints of the colonies unfounded, refused 
to yield to their demands, and proceeded to reduce them to obedience; not by the en- 
forcenient of laws, but by military force, armies and navies, according to the rules and 
laws of war. Captives taken in battle with arms in their liands, fighting against Great 
Britain, were not executed as traitors, but held as prisoners of war, and exchanged ao- 
cordiiig to the usages of civilized nations. The laws of nations, the principles of human- 
ity, of civilization, and Christianity, demanded that the Government de facto should be 
acknowledged and treated as such. While the right to prosecute war for the purpose of 
reducing the revolted provinces to obedience still remained, yet it was a military remedy, 
and could only be exercised according to the established jninciples of war. 

It is said that, after one of the earliest engagements, the British general threatened to 
execute as traitors ail the prisoners he ha<l taken in battle ; and that General Washington 
replied that he, too, had taken some prisoners, and would shoot two for one until the 
British general should respect the laws of war and treat his prisoners accordingly. May 
divine Providence, in His infinite wisdom and merc\% save our country from the humilia- 
tion and calamities which now seem almost inevitable. South Carolina has already 
declared her independence of the. United States; has expelled the Federal authorities 
from her limits, and established a Government de facto, with a military force to sustain 
it. The revolution is complete, there being no man within her limits who denies the 
authority of her government or acknowledges allegiance to that of the United States. 
There is'every reason to believe that seven other States will soon follow her example; and 
much ground to apprehend that the other slaveholding States will follow them. 

How are we going to prevent an alliance between these seceding States by which they 
may establish a~Federal Government, at least de facto, for themselves? If they shall do 
so, and expel the authorities of the United States* from their limits, as South Carolina has 
done, and others are about to do, so that there shall be no human being within their 
boundaries who acknowledges allegiance to the United States, how are we going to enforce 
the laws? Armies and navies can make war, but cannot enforce laws in this country. 
The laws can be enforced only by the civil authorities, assisted by the military as a. posse 
coiailatiis, when resisted in executing judicial process. Who is to issue the judicial pro- 
cess in a State where there is no judge, no court, no judicial functionary? Who is to 



10 

perform the duties of marshal in executing the process where no man will or dare accept 
office? Who are to serve on juries while every citizen is pnrticeps crimini.s with the 
accused? IIow are you going to comply with the Constitution in respect to a jury trial, 
where tliere are no men qualified to serve on the jury ? I agree that the laws should be 
enforced. I hold that our Government is clothed with the power and duty of using all 
the means necessary to the enforcement of tlie laws, accordimj to the Constitntiov and laws. 
The President is sworn to tlie faithful performance of this duty. I do not propose to in- 
quire, at this time, how far, and with what fidelity, the President has performed that 
duty. His conduct and dutj', in this regard, including acts of commission and omission, 
while the rebellion was in its incipient stages, and when confined to a few individuals, 
present a very different (piestion from that which we are now discussing — after the revo- 
lution has become complete, and the Federal authorities have been expelled, and the 
Government dn facto put into practical operation, and in the unrestrained and unresisted 
exercise of all the powers and functions of Government, local and national. 

But we are told that secession is wrong, and that South Carolina had no right to secede. 
I agree that it is wrong, unlawful, unconstitutional, criminal. In my opinion South Caro- 
lina had no right to secede ; but she has done it. She has declared her independence of 
us, efi'aced the last vistige of our civil authority, established a foreign Government, and is 
now engaged in the preliminary steps to open diplomatic intercourse with the great 
Powers of the world. What next? If her act was illegal, unconstitutional, and wrong, 
have we no remedy? Unquestionably we have the right to use all the power and force 
necessary to regain possession of that portion of the United States, in order that we may 
again enforce our Constitution and laws upon the inhabitants. We can enforce our laws 
in those States, Territories, and places only which are within our possession. It often 
happens that the territorial rights of a country extend beyond the hniits of their actual 
possessions. That is our case at present in respect to South Carolina. Our right of juris- 
diction over that State for Federal purposes, according to the Constitution, Las not been 
destroyed or impaired by the ordinance of secession, or any act of the convention, or of 
the de facto Government. The riglit remains, but the possession is lost for the time being. 
" How shall we regain the possession ?" is the pertinent inquiry. It may be done by arms, 
or by a peaceable adjustment of the matters in controversy. 

Are we prepared for imr? I do not mean that kind of preparation which consists of 
armies and navies, and supplies, and munitions of war; but are we prepared in oua 
HEARTS for war with our own brethren and kindred ? I confess I am not. While I affirm 
that the Constitution is, and was intended to be, a bond of perpetual Union ; while I can 
do no act and utter no word that will acknowledge or countenance the right of secession; 
while I aflarm the right and duty of the Federal Government to use all legitimate means 
to enforce the laws, put down rebellion, and suppress insurrection, 1 will not meditate 
war, nor tolerate the idea, until every efi'ort at peaceful adjustment shall have been ex- 
hausted, and the last ray of hope shall have deserted the patriot's Iieart. Then, and not 
till then, will I consider and determine what course my duty to my country may require 
me to pursue in such an emergency. In my opinion war is disunion, certain, inevitable, 
irrevocable. I am for peace to save the Union. 

_ I have said that I cannot recognize nor countenance the right of secession. Illinois, 
eituated in the interior of the continent, can never acknowledge the right of the States 
bordering on the seas to withdraw from the Union at pleasurCj^aud form alliances among 
themselves and with other countries by which we shall be exclu.led from all access to 
the ocean, from all intercourse and commerce with foreign nations. We can never con- 
sent to be shut up within the circle of a Chinese wall, erected and controlled by others, 
without our permission, or to any other sj-stem of isolation bj which we shall be deprived 
of any communication with the rest of the civilized world. Those States which are situ- 
ated _m the interior of the continent can never assent to any such doctrine. Our rights, 
our interests, our safety, our existence as a free people, forbid it! The northwestern 
States were ceded to the United States before the Constitution was made, on condition of 
perpetual union with the other States. The Territories were oiganized, settlers invited, 
lands purchased, and homes made, on the pledge of your plighted faith of perpetual 

When tliere were but two hundred thousand inhabitants scattered over that vast region 
the navigation of the Mississippi was deemed by Mr. Jefferson so important and essential 
to their interests and prosperity, that he did not hesitate to declare that if Spain or France 
insisted upon retaining possession of the mouth of that river, it would become the duty 
of tlie Lnited States to take it by arms, if they failed to acquire it by treaty. If the 
possession of that river, with jurisdiction over its mouth and cliannel, was indispensable 
to the people of the Northwest, when we had two hundred thousand inhabitants, is it 
reasonable to suppose that we will voluntarily surrender it now when we have ten mil- 
lion peopled Louisiana was not purchased for the exclusive benefit of the few Spanish 
and French residents in the territory, nor for those who might become residents. These 
considerations did not enter into the negotiations and formed no inducement to the acqui- 
Bition Louisiana was purchased with the national treasure, for the common benefit of 
tne whole Union in general, and for the safety, convenience, and prosperity of the North- 
west in particular. We paid $1.5,000,000 for the territory. We have expended much 



11 

more than that sum in the extinguishnient of Indian titles, the removal of Indians, the 
survey of lands, the erection of custom-houses, light-houses, forts, and arsenals. We ad- 
mitted the inhabitants into the Union on an equal footing witli ourselves. Now we are 
called upon to acknowledge the moral and constitutional right of those people to dissolve 
tlje Union without the consent of the other States; to seize the forts, arsenals, and other 
public property, and appropriate tliem to their own use; to take possession of the Missis- 
sippi river, and exercise jurisdiction over the same, and to reannex herself to France, or 
remain an independent nation, or to form alliances with such other foreign Powers, as 
she, in the flenitude of her sovereign will and pleasure, may see fit. If this thing is to 
be done — peaceably, if you can ; and forcibly, if you must — all I propose to say at this 
time is, that you cannot expect us of the Isorthwest to yield our assent to it, nor to ao- 
kuowledge your right to do it, or the propriety and justice of the act. 

The respectful attention with which my friend from Florica (Mr. Yulee) is listening to 
me, reminds me that his State furnishes an apt illustration of this modern doctrine of 
secession. We paid five million for the Territory. We expended marvelous sums in sub- 
duing the Indians, extinguisiiing Indian titles, removal of Indians beyond her borders, 
surveying the lands, building light-houses, navy yards, forts, and arsenals, with untold 
millions for the never-ending Florida claims. I assure my friend that I do not refer to 
these things in an offensive sense, for he knows how much respect I have for him, and has 
not foigotten my efforts in the House, many y-ears ago, to secure the admission of his 
State into the Union, in order that he might represent her, as he has since done with so 
much ability and fidelity, in this body. I3ut I will say that it never occurred to me at 
that time that the Statewhose admission into the Union I was advocating would be one 
of the first to join in a scheme to break up the Union. I submit it to him whether it is 
not an extraordinary spectacle to see that State, which has cost us so much blood and 
treasure, turn her back on the Union which has fostered and protected her when she was 
too feeble to protect herself, and seize the light-houses, navy-yards, forts, and arsenals, 
■which, although within her boundaries, were erected with national funds, for the benefit 
and defence of the whole Union. 

I do not knoAv that I can find a more striking illustration of this doctrine of secession 
tlian was suggested to my mind when reading the President's last annual message. My 
attention was first arrested by the remarkable passage, that the Federal Government had 
no power to coerce a State back into the Union if she did secede ; and my admiration was 
unbounded when I foutid, a few lines afterwards, a recommendation to appropriate money 
to purchase the island of Cuba. It occurred to me instantly, what a brilliant achieve- 
ment it would be to pay Spain ?:30U,000,000 for Cuba, and immediately admit the island 
into the Union as a State, and let her secede and reannex liersdf to Spain the next day, 
when the Spanish Queen ;ivould be ready to sell the island again for half price, or double 
price, according to the gullibility of the purchaser! (Laughter.) 

During my service in Congress it was one of my pleasant duties to take an active part 
in the annexation of Texas; and at a subsequent session to write and introduce the bill 
which made T^xas one of the Slates of the Union. Out of that annexation grew the war 
with Mexico, in which we expended §100,000,000; and were left to mourn the loss of 
about ten thousand as gallant men as ever died upon a battle-field for the honor and glory 
of their country ! Wc have since spent millions of money to protect Texas against her 
own Indians, to establish forts and fortifications to protect her frontier settlements, and 
to defend her against the assaults of all enemies until she became strong enough to protect 
herself. We are now called upon to acknowledge that Texas has a moral, just, and con- 
stitutional right to rescind the act of admission into the Union; repudiate her ratification 
of the resolutions of annexation; seize the forts and public buildings which were con- 
structed with our money; appropriate the same to her own use, and leave us to pay 
5;100,0<i(),uOM, and mourn the death of the brave men who sacrificed their lives in defend- 
ing the integrity of her soil. In the name of Hardin, and Bissell, and Harris, and of the 
seven thou.sand gallant spirits from Illinois, who fought bravely upon every battle-field 
of Mexico, 1 protest against the right of Texas to separate herself from this Union without 
our consent. . 

Mr. HEMPHILL. Mr. President, if the Senator from Illinois will allow me, 1 will in- 
quire whether there were no other causes assigned by the United States for the war with 
Mexico tliau simply the defence of Texas? 

Mr. DOUGLAS. I will answer the question. We undoubtedly did assign other acts 
OS beimr causes for war, which had existed for years, if we had chosen to treat them so; 
but we did not go to war for any other cause than the annexation of Texas, as is shown 
in the act of Congress recognizing the existence of war with Mexico, in which it is declared 
that " war exist's by the act of the Kepublic of Mexico." The sole cause ot grievance 
which Mexico had against us, and for which she commenced the war, was our annexation 
of Texas. Hence, none can deny that the Mexican war was solely and exclusively the 
result of the annexation of Texas. 

Mr HKMPHILL. I will inquire further, whether the United States paid anything to 
Texas for the annexation of her three hundred and seventy thousand square miles ot ter- 
ritory, and whether the United States has not got !?500,000,000 by the acquisition of Cali- 
fornia through that war with Mexico. 



12 

Mr. DOUGLAS. Sir, we did not pay anything for brin^ring Texas into the Union,; for 
■we did not get any of her lands, except that we purchased from her some poor lands after- 
wards, which she "did not own, and paid her $10,000,000 for them. (Laugliter.) But we 
did spend blood a!i<l treasirife in the,.^acquisit!on and subsequent defence of Texas. 

Kow, sir, I will answw'^his question in respect to California. The treaty of peacB 
brought California and New Mexico into the Union. Our people moved there, took pos- 
session of the lands, settled up the country, and erected a State of v/hich the UnitedStatea 
have a rio-lit to be proud. We have expended millions upon millions for fortifications in 
California^ and for navy-yards, and mints, and public buildings, and land surveys, and 
feeding tlie Indians, and protecting her people. I believe the public land sales do not 
amount to more than one-tenth of the cost of the surveys, according to the returns that 
have been made. It is true that the people of California have dug a large amount of 
gold (principally out of the lands belonging to the United States) and sold it to us; but I 
am not aware that we are under any more obligations to them for selling it to us, than 
tliey are to us for buying it of them. The people of Texas, during the same time, have 
probably made cotton and agricultural pi'oductions to a much larger value, and sold some 
of it to New England, and some to Old England. I suppose the benefits of the bargain 
were reciprocal, and the one was under just as much obligation as the other for the mutual 
benefits of the sale and purchase. 

The question remains, whether, after paying $15,000,000 for California — as the Senator 
from Texas has called my attention to that State — and perhaps as much more in protecting 
and defending !ier, she has any moral, constitutional right to annul the compact between 
her and the Union, and form alliances with foi'eign Powers, and leave us to pay ti\e coat 
and expenses? I cannot recognize any such doctrine. In my opinion, the Constitution 
was intended to be a bond of perpetual Union. It begins with the declaration in the pre- 
amble, that it is made in order " to form a more perfect Union," and every section and 
paragraph in the instrument implies perpetuity. It was intended to last forever, and 
was so understood when ratified by the people of the several States. New York and 
Virginia have been referred to as having ratified with the reserved right to withdraw or 
secede at pleasure. This is a mistake. The correspondence between General Hamilton 
and Mr. Madison, at the time, is conclusive on this point. After Virginia had ratified the 
Constitution, General Hamilton, who was a member of the New York convention, wrote 
to Mr. Madison that New York would probably ratify the Constitution for a term of years, 
and reserve the right to withdraw after that time, if certain amendments were not sooner 
adopted ; to which Mr. Madison replied that such a raLifi(!ation would not make New 
York a member of the Union; that the ratification must be*unconditional, in. fofo and 
forever, or not at all ; that the same question was considered at Richmond, and al)andoned 
when Virginia ratified the Constitution. Hence, the declaration of Virginia and New York, 
that they had not surrendered the right to resume the delegated powers, must be undep- 
etood as referriiig to the right of revolution, which nobody acknowledges more freely than 
I do, and not to the right of secession. 

The Constitution being made as a bond of perpetual Union; its fraraers proceeded ix> 
provide against the necessities of revolution, by prescribing the mode in wh>ch it-might 
be amended; so that if, in the course of time, the condition of the count r}- should so 
change as to require a different fundamental law, amendments might be made peaceably, 
in the manner prescribed in the instrument; and thus avoid the necessity of ever resorting 
to revolution. Having provided for a perpetual Union, and for amendments to the Con- 
stitution, thej^ next inserted a clause for admitting new States, but no provision for the 
withdrawal of any of the other States. I will not argue the question of the right of 
secession any further than to enter my protest against the whole doctrine. 1 deny thuA 
there is any foundation for it in the Constitution, in the nature of the compact, "in thiJ 
principles of the Government, or injustice, or in good faith. 

Nor do I sympathize at all in the apprehensions and misgivings I hear expressed about 
coercion. We are told tha* inasmuch as our Government is founded upon the will of the 
people, or the con.sent of the governed, therefore coercion is incompatible with re])ubli- 
canism. Sir, the word government means coercion. There can be no Government with- 
out coercion- Coercion is the vital principle upon which all Governmeut.s rest. Withdraw 
tlie right of coercion, and you dissolve your Government. If every man would perform 
his duty and respect theriglits of his neighbors voluntarily, there would be no necessity 
for any Government on earth. The necessity of governmeiat is found to consist in tlie fact 
that some men will not do right unless coerced to do so. The object of all government 
is to coerce and compel every man to do his duty, who would not otherwise perform it 
Hence I do not subscribe at all to this doctrine that coercion is not to be used in a free 
Government. It must be used in all Governments, no matter what their form or what 
their principles. 

But coercion must always be used in the mode prescribed in the Constitution and laws. 
I hold that the Federal Government is, and ought to be, clothed witli the power and 
duty to use all the means necessary to coerce obedience to all laws made in pursuance of 
the Constitution. But the proposition to subvert the de facto government of South 
Carolina, and to reduce the people of that State into subjection to our Federal au- 
thority, no longer involves the question of enforcing the laws la a country within our 



13 

poesossion, but it does involve the question whether we will make war on a State which 
naa withdrawn her alle^ance and expelled our authorities, with a view of subjecting her 
to our possession for the purpose of enforcing our laws within her limits. 

We are bound, by the usages of nations, by the laws of civilization, by the uniform 
practice of our own Government, to acknowledge the existence of a Government de facto 
to long as it maintains its undivided authority. 'When Louis Phillippe fled from the 
throne of France, and Lamartine suddenly one morning found himself the head of a pro- 
vi»ional Government, I believe it was but three days until the American minister recog- 
nized the Government <i'^ fucto. Texas was a Government de facto, not recognized by 
Mexico, when we annexed her; and Mexico was a Government de facto, not recognized 
by Spain, when Tdxas revolted. The laws of nations recognize Governments de facto 
where they exercise and maintain undivided sway, leaving the question of their authority 
de Jure to be determined by the people interested in the Government. Kow, as a man 
■who love-* the Union and desires to see it maintained forever, and to see the laws enfoi'ced, 
and rebellion put down, and insurrection suppressed, and order maintained, I desire to 
know of my Union-K'ving friends on the other side of the Chamber how they intend to 
enforce thi; laws in tlie eecedinj Slates, except by making war, conquering them first, 
and ailniinJMlering the laws in tlicm afterwards. 

In my c]'!! ion we liave reached a [>oint where disunion is inevitable, unless some com- 
promise, f •! iided upon mutual concession, can be made. I prefer compromise to war. I 
prefer cot.cc-iiyn to a dissolution of the Union. When I avow myself in favor of com- 
pronii^f, I d>> not mean that one side should give up all that it has claimed, noi- that the 
other side ^h'juld ;;i\e up everythir.g for which it has contended. !Nor do 1 ask any maa 
to come 'o my standard; but I simply say that I will meet every one half way who is 
Ti'illing to preserve the peace of the country, and save the Union from disruption upon 
principles of compromise and concession. 

In my judgment, no Bystem of compromise can be effectual and permanent which does 
not banish the slavery qtiestion from the Halls of Congress and the arena of Federal poli- 
tics, by irrepoululde constitutional provision. We have tried compromises by law, com- 
proniitic* l)V act of Congress, and now we are engaged in the small business of crimination 
and recriiiiii ntion, as to wlio is rcsjionsible for not having lived up to them in good faith, 
and for having broken failh. I want wliatever compn^mise is agreed to plated be^-ond 
tlie reach of party politics and partisan policv, by being made irrevocable in tjie Consti- 
tution iu<\(, no that every man that I'.nlds ofifce will be bound Vjj- his oath to support iL 
ITiere ui ■• "n-veral modes in which this irritating question m.ay be withdrawn from Con- 
gress, peace restored, the ritrhts of the States maintained, and the Union rendered secure. 
One of ihom — one to which I van cordially assent — has been presented by the venerable 
Senator fr< in Kentucky, (Mr. CniTrENUEN.) The jonrnnl of the committee of tliirteen 
riirtwa that I voted for it in coniiiiittee. I am prepored to vote for it again. I shall not 
occupy time now in discussing the question whether my vote to make a partition between 
the two seitjons, instead of referring the question to the people, will be consistent with 
my picviou^ record or not. Tlie country has no very greot interest in my consistency. 
Tho pres«M vutiou of this Union, the integrity of this Republic, is of more importance 
than party p'.-itfoms or individual records. Hence I have no hesitation in saying to 
Senators on all sides of this ChauiLer, that I am prepared to act on this question with 
reference to the present exigencies of tlie case, os if I had never given a vote,-or uttered 
a word, or liud an opinion upon tho subject. 

Wliy cannot you Hepublicaua accede to the re-establishment and extension of the Mis- 
souri compromise linef You have sung peans enough in its praise, and uttered impreca- 
tions and curses enough on my head for its repeal, one would think, to justify you now 
Li claiming a triumi>h by its re-establishment. If you are willing to give up your party 
feelings — to sink the partisan in the patriot — and help me to re-establish and extend that 
line, OS a perpetual bond of peace between the Xorth and the South, I will promise yon 
never to remind you in the future of your denunciations of the Missouri compromise so 
long OS 1 was supporting it, and of your praises of the same measure when we removed 
it from the statute-book, after vou had caused it to be abandoned, by rendering it impos- 
sible fur us to carry it out. I seek no partisan advantage ; I desire no personal triuujph. 
I am willing to let by-gones be by-gones with every man who, in this exigency, will show 
by his vote that he loves his country more than his party. 

I presentt d to the committee of thirteen, and also introduced into the Senate, another 
plan by which the slavery question may be taken out of Congress and the peace of the 
country mniiitained. It is, that Congi-ess shall mnke no law on the subject of slavery in 
the Territi'iie*, and that the existing' i^latus of each Territory on that subject, as it now 
stands by law, shall remain unchanged until it has fifty thousand inhabitants, when it 
shall have the right of self-governme'iit as to its domestic policy, but with only a delegate 
in each House of Congress until it has the population required by the Federal ratio for a 
Representative in Congress, when it shall be admitted into the Union on an equal footmg 
vilh the oriuinal States. I put the number of inhabitants at fifty thousand before the 
people of the Tenntory shall change the status in respect to slavery as a fair compromise 
between tho conllicting opinions upon this subject. The two extremes. North and South, 
unite in condemning the doctrine of popular sovereignty in the Territories upon th« 



14 

ground that the first few settlers ought not to be permitted to decide so important a 
question for those who are to come after them. I have never considered that objection 
well taken, for the reason chat no Territory should be organized with the right to elect 
a Legislature and make its own laws upon all rightful subjects of legislation, until it con- 
tained a suiiicient population to constitute a political community; and whenever Con- 
gress should decide that there was a sufficient population, capable of self-government, by 
organizing the Territory, to govern themselves upon all other subjects, I could never 
perceive any good reason why tlie same political community should not be permitted to 
decide the slavery question for themselves. 

But, since we are now trying to compromise our difficulties upon the basis of mutual 
concessions, I propose to meet both extremes half way, by fixing the number at fifty 
thousand. This number, certainly, ought to be satisfactory to those States v\'iiich have 
been a<lmitLed into the Union with less than fifty thousand inhabitants. Oregon, Florida, 
Arkansas, ilississippi, Alabama, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, were each admitted into the 
Union, I believe, with less than that number of inhabitants. Surely the Senators and 
Representatives from those States do not doubt that fifty thousand people were enough 
to constitute a political community capable of deciding the slavery question for themselves. 
I now invite attention to the next projjosition. 

In order to allay all apprehension, North or South, that territory would be acquired 
in the future for sectional or partisan purposes, by adding a large number of free States 
on the North, or slave States on the South, with the view of giving the one section or 
the other a dangerous political ascendency, I have inserted the provision that "No more 
territory shall be acquired by the United States, except by treaty or the concurrent vote 
of two-thirds in eacli House of Congress." If this provision should be incorporated into 
the Constitution, it would be impossible for either section to annex any territory without 
the concurrence of a large portion of the other section ; and hence there need be no ap- 
prehension tliat any territorj- would hereafter be acquired for any other than such na- 
tional considerations as would commend the subject to the approbation of both sections. 

I have also inserted a provision confining the right of suffrage and of holding ofiice to 
white men, excluding the African race. I have also inserted a provision for the coloniz- 
ation of free negroes from such States as may desire to have them removed, to districts 
of countrj' to be acquired in Africa and South America. In addition to these, 1 have 
adopted the various provisions contained in the proposition of the Senator froni Ken- 
tucky, in reference to fugitive slaves, the abolition of slavery in the forts, arsenals, and 
dockyards in tlie slave States and in the District of Columbia, and tlie otlier provisions for 
the safety of the South. I believe this to be a fair basis of amicable adjustment. If you 
of the Republican side are not willing to accept this, nor the pi'oposition of the Senator 
from Kentucky, (Mr. Crittenden,) pray tell us what you are willing to do? I address 
the inquiry to the Republicans alone, for the reason that in the committee of thirteen, a 
few days ago, every member from the South, including those from the cotton States, 
(Messrs. Toombs and D.wis,) expressed their readiness to accept the proposition of my 
venerable friend from Kentucky (Mr. Crittenden) as a final settlement of the controversy, 
if tendered and sustained by the Republican members. Hence, the sole responsibility of 
our disagreement, and the only difficulty in the way of an amicable adjustment, is with 
the Republican party. 

At first, I thought your reason for declining to adjust this question amicably, was that 
the Constitution, as it stands, was good enough, and that you would make no amendment 
to it. That position has already been waived. The great leader of the Republican 
party, (Mr Seward,) by the unanimous concurrence of his friends, brought into the com- 
mittee of thirteen a proposition to amend the Constitution. Inasmuch, therefore, as you 
are willing to amend the instrument, and to entertain propositions of adjustment, why 
not go furtljer, an<l relieve the apprehensions of tlie southern people on al'l points where 
you do not intend to operate aggressively? You offer to amend the Constitution, by de- 
claring that no future amendments shall be made which shall empower Congress to in- 
terfere with Slavery in the States? 

Now, if you do not intend to do any other act prejudicial to their constitutional rights 
and safet}-, Y>,-hy not relieve their apprehensions, by inserting in your own proposed 
amendment to the Constitution, such further provisions as willj in like manner, render it 
impossible for you to do that whieh they apprehend you intend to do, aud which you 
have no purpose of doing, if it be true that you have no such purpose? For the purpose 
of removiug the apprehensions of the southern people, and for no other purpose, you pro- 
pose to amend the Constitujion, so as to render it impossible, in all future time, ior Con- 
gress to interfere with slavery in the States where it may exist under the laws thereof. 
Why not insert a similar amendment in respect to slavery in the District of Columbia, 
and in the nav^'-yards, forts, arsenals, and other places within the limits of the slave- 
holding States, over which Congress has exclusive jurisdiction ? Why not insert a similar 
provision in respect to the slave trade between the slaveholding States? Tlie Southern 
people have more serious apprehensions on these points than they have of your direct in- 
terference with slavery in the States. 

If their apprehensions on these several points are groundless, is it not a duty you owe 
to God and your country to relieve their anxiety and remove all causes of discontent? 



15 

Is there not quite as much reason for relieving their apprehensions upon these points, iu 
regard to wliich they are much more sensitive, as in respect to your direct intei-ference ia 
the States, where they linow and you acknowledge, that you have no power to interfere 
as the Constitution now stands? The fact that you propose to give the assjprance on the 
one point and peremptorily refuse to give it on "the others, seems to authorize the pre- 
sumption that you do intend to use the powers of the Federal Government for the pur- 
pose of direct interference with slavery and the slave trade everywhere else, with the 
view to its indirect effects upon slavery in the States; or, in the language of Mr. Lincoln, 
■with the view <jf its "ultimate extinction in all the States, old as well as new, north as 
well as soutii." 

If you had exiiausted your ingenuity in devising a plan for the express purpose of in- 
creasing the apprehensions and intlaming tiie passions of the southern people, with the 
view of driving them into revolution an<l disunion, none covild have been contrived bet- 
ter calciilaied to accomplish the object than the offering of that one amendment to the 
Constitution, and rejecting all others which are infinitely more important to the safety 
and domestic tranquillity of the slaveholding States. 

In m}^ opinion, we have now reached a point where this agitation must close, and all 
the matters in controversy be finally determined by constitutional amendments, or civil 
war and the disruption of ttie Union are inevitable. My friend from Oregon, (Mr. Baker,) 
who has addressed the Senate for the last two days, will fail in his avowed purpose to 
"evade" the question, lie claims to be liberal and conservative; and, I must confess, 
that he seems the most liberal of any gentleman on that side of the Chambei', always ex- 
cepting the noble and patriotic speech of the Senator from Connecticut, (Mr. Dixon;) and 
the utmost extent to which the Senator from Oregon would consent to go, was to devise 
a .scheme by which the real question at issue could be evaded. 

I regret the determination, to which I apprehend the Republican Senators have come, 
to make no adjustment, eulertaia no propositions, and listen to no compromise of the 
matters iu controversy. 

I fear, from all the indications, that they are disposed to treat the matter as a party 
question, to be determined in caucus with reference to its effects upon the prospects of 
their party, raMier than upon the peace of tlie country and the safety of the Union. I 
invoke their deliberate judgment whether it is not a d'angerous experiment, for any po- 
litical party to demonstrate to the American people that the unity of their party is dearer 
to them than the Union of tliese States. The argument is that the Chicago platform 
having been ratified by the people in a majority of the States must be maintained at all 
hazards, !io matter what the consequence to tlie country. I insist that they are mistaken 
in the fact when they assert that iliis question was decided by the American people in the 
late election. The American people have not decided tliat they preferred the disruption 
of this Government, and civil war with all its liorrors and miseries, to surrendering one 
iota of the Cliicago platform. If you believe that the people are with you on this issue, 
let the question be submitted to the people on the proposition offered by the Senator from 
Kentucky, or mine, or any other fail compromise, and I will venture the prediction that 
your own people will ratify the proposed amendments to the Constitution, in order to 
take this slavery agitation out of Congress, and restore peace to the country, and insure 
the perpetuity of the Union. 

Why not give the people a chance? It is an important crisis. There is now a different 
issue presented from that iu the presidential election. I have no doubt that the people 
of Massa<'hnsetts, by an overwhelming nuijority, are in favor of a prohibition of slavery 
in the Territories by an act of Congress. An overwhelming majority of the same people 
were in favor of the instant prohibition of the African slave tra.le, on moral and religious 
grounds, when the Constitution was made. When they found that the Constitution could 
not b.- adopted and the Union preserved, without surrendering their objections on the 
slavery question, thev, in the spirit of patriotism and of Christian feeling, preferred the 
lesser evil to the greater, and ratified the C(mstitution without their favorite provision 
in regard to slavery. Give them a chance to decide now between the ratification of these 
proposed Hmendmcuts to the Constitution, and the consequences which your policy will 
inevitably produce. . , •. 

Why not allow the people to pass on these questions? All we have to do is to submit 
them to the States. If the people reject them, theirs will be the responsibility, and no 
harm will have been done by the referenee. If they accept them, the country will be 
safe, and at (leace. The political party which shall refuse to allow the people to determine 
for themselves at the ballot-box the issue between revolution and war on the one side, 
and obstinate adherence to a party platform on the other, will assume a fearful respousi- 
biUty. A war uiH>n a political issue, waged by the people of eighteen Stated against the 
peoMle and domestic institutions of fifteen sister States, is a fearful and revolting thought. 
The South will be a unit, and desperate, under the belief that your object in waging war 
is their destruction, and not the preservation of the Union; that you meditate servile m- 
Burrectiou, and the abolition of slavery in the southern States, by fire and sword, in the 
name, and under pretext of enforcing the laws, and vindicating the authority oi the Gov- 
ernmeut. You know that such is the prevailing, and, I may say, unanimous opinion at the 



16 

South ; and that ten million people are preparing for the terrible conflict under that con- 
viction. 

When there is such an irrepressible discontent pervading ten million people, penetrating 
the bosom of everj- man, woman, and child, and, in their estimation, involving everything 
that is valuable and dear on earth, is it not time to pause and reflect whether there is not 
some cause, real or imaginary, for apprehension ? If there be a just cause for it, in God's 
name, in the name of humanity and civilization, let it be removed. Will we not be guilty, 
in the sight of Heaven and of posterity, if we do not remove all just cause before pro- 
ceeding to extremities? If, on the contrary, there be no real foundation for these appre- 
hensions; if it be all a mistake, and yet they, believing it to be solemn reality, are de- 
termined to act on that belief, is it not equally our duty to remove the misapprehension ? 
Hence the obligation to remove the causes of discontent, whether real or ioaagiuary, is 
alike imperative upon us, if we wish to preserve the peace of the country and the Union 
of the States. 

It matters not, so far as the peace of the country and the preservation of the Union 
are concerned, whether the apprehensions of the southern people are well founded or not, 
so long as they believe them, and are determined to act upon that belief. If war comes, 
it moist liave an end at some time; and that termination, I apprehend, will be a final 
separation. Wliether the war last one year, seven yeai's, or thirty years, the ]'esult must 
be the same — a cessation of hostilities when the parties become exhausted, and a treaty 
of peace recognizing the separate independence of each section. The history of the world 
does not furuisli an instance, where war has raged for a series of years between two classes 
of States, divided by a geographical line under the same national Government, which has 
ended in reconciliation and reunion. Extermination, siibjugation, or separation, one of 
the three, must be the result of war between the northern and southern States. Surely, 
you do not expect to exterminate or subjugate ten million people, the entire population 
of one section, as a means of preserving amicable relations between the two sections! 

I repeat, then, my solemn conviction, tliat war means disunion — final, irrevocable, 
eternal separation. I see no alternative, therefore, but a fair compromise, founded on tlie 
basis of mutual concessions, alike honorable, just, and beneficial to all parties, or civil 
Tvar and disunion. Is there anything humiliating in a fair compromise of conflicting in- 
terests, opinions, and theories, for the sake of peace, union, and safety 3 Read the debates 
of the Fedei-al convention, which formed our glorious Constitution, and you will find 
noble examples, worthy of imitation ; instances where sages and patriots were willing to 
surrender cherislied theories and principles of government, believed to be essential to the 
best form of society, for the sake of peace and unity. 

I never understood that wise and good men ever regarded mutual concessions by such 
men as Washington, Madison, Franklin, and Hamilton, as evidences of weakness, cow- 
ardice, or want of patriotism. On the contrary, tliis spirit of conciliation and compro- 
mise has ever been considered, and v.'ill in all-time be regarded as the highest evidence 
which their great deeds and immortal services ever furnished of their patriotism, wisdom, 
foresight, and devotion to their country and their race. Can we not afford to imitat-e 
their example in this momentous crisis ? Are we to be told that we must not do our 
duty to our country lest we injure the party ; that no compromise can be effected with- 
out violating the party platform upon which we were elected? Better that all party 
platforms be scattereilto the winds ; better that all political organizations be broken up; 
better that every public man and politician in Anierica be consig-ned to political martyr- 
dom, than that the Union be destroyed and the country plunged into civil Vfav. 

It seems that party platforms, pride of opinion, personal consistency, fear of political 
martyrdom, are the only obstacles to a satisfactory adjustment. Have we nothing else 
to live for but political position ? Have we no other inducement, no other incentive to 
our eft'orts, our toils, and our sacrifices? Most of us have children, the objects of our 
tenderest affections and deepest solicitude, whom we hope to leave beJiind us to enjoy 
the rewards of our labors in a happy, prosperous, and united country, under the best 
Government the wisdom of man ever devised or the sun of Heaven ever shone upon. 
Can we make no concessions, no sacrifices, for the sake of our children, that they may 
have a country to live in, and a Government to protect them, when party platforms and 
political honors shall avail us nothing in the day of final reckoning ? 

In conclusion, I have only to renew the assurance that I am prepared to co-operate 
cordially with the friends of a fair, just, and honorable compromise, in securing such 
amendments to the Constitution as will expel the slavery agitation from Congress and 
the arena of Federal politics forever, and restore peace to the country, and preserve our 
liberties and Union as the most precious legacy we can transmit to our posterity. 

Printed by Lemuel Towers, at $1 00 per hundred copies. 



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